Mark Hopkins

Mark Hopkins

Mark Hopkins

Mark Hopkins

Excerpt

An estimate of Mark Hopkins cannot be out of place in a series of American Religious Leaders. He belonged among the later religious leaders of New England. His endowments, his attainments, and his long service made him a unique figure among the teachers of this age. But for a complete estimate of him as a man, there is a lack of material. His own letters, with the exception of those written to the late Rev. Dr. Ray Palmer and President Garfield, have been generally lost. His life in a country town was devoid of picturesque and varying incident. He lived one side of the advantages of stimulating society and the intellectual discoveries of his time. The great thrills of modern thought reached him chiefly through newspapers and books. His profound and far-reaching influence in the country was for that reason all the surer testimony to the wisdom and power of his manhood.